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The 2023 BET Awards was a jam-packed night, with Beyonce, Drake, and SZA standing out among those taking home trophies. Also, Busta Rhymes received a long overdue Lifetime Achievement Award.
The annual awards night was Sunday night (June 25th) at the Microsoft Theater in Los Angeles, California. It was made more so by the fact that the night was focused on the celebration of 50 years of Hip-Hop, which saw numerous tributes take place and key wins by some of the most popular artists today including Quavo & Offset of the Migos honoring their late member, Takeoff.
Beyoncé and SZA reigned supreme as the biggest winners of the evening with three awards each. In a surprise, both songstresses would tie for Album of The Year with Renaissance and SOS, respectively. “Break My Soul” won the Viewer’s Choice Award and the BET HER Award as well. As for SZA, she would also win Video of The Year for her stylish “Kill Bill” video and Best Female R&B/Pop Artist, beating out a stacked field of artists including Beyoncé, Lizzo, Ari Lennox, Tems, H.E.R., and Coco Jones.
Drake followed behind with two wins on the night for Best Collaboration for his appearance on “Wait For U” by Future featuring Nigerian singer Tems, and Best Group for his team-up with 21 Savage for the hit album Her Loss. The win was his second in the category – he previously won the award seven years ago with Future. Kendrick Lamar won Best Male Hip-Hop Artist, his record-setting sixth win in the category. He was the leader in nominations for the evening with seven. Latto would take home the award for Best Female Hip-Hop Artist, and show love to other women rappers in her acceptance speech.
The heartwarming moment of the night came as veteran MC Busta Rhymes was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award, and he delivered an emotional speech detailing his journey while admonishing other rappers to stop fighting among themselves.
“Y’all messing up the bag. Y’all messing up the energy. I don’t like when I talk to these dudes that run these streaming platforms and they talking about, ‘You know, we turning the consumer off because there’s so much little this and little that going on with you rappers.’ We’re gonna stop that. We’re gonna love each other, and we gonna get to this money,” he said.
